Ty Blach (8-11, 4.68) gave up three runs on five hits and two walks while striking out one in five and two-thirds innings. Wood hit a solo home run in the third inning. Jose Pirela hit a solo home run, Wil Myers scored on a wild pitch by Kyle Crick, and Austin Hedges single drove in Jabari Blash in the sixth inning. Blash hit a single in the eighth inning to drive in Myers.

The Los Angeles Dodgers (91-39) come to Petco Park for four games beginning tomorrow at 7:10pm PDT. Dinelson Lamet (7-5, 4.60) starts tomorrow against Clayton Kershaw (15-2, 2.04), who comes off the disabled list to make his first start since July.Read More…

The Padres begin a four-game series against the Cincinnati Reds (45-66) at Great American Ballpark tonight at 4:10pm PDT. Jhoulys Chacin (11-7, 3.99) starts the first game against Tim Adleman (5-9, 5.42).Read More…

Logan Verrett (3-8, 5.36) last just two and two-thirds innings, giving up eight runs on six hits and three walk with four strikeouts. After Verrett loaded the bases with just one out in the first inning, Ryan Schimpf hit his first career grand slam and Jabari Blash followed that up with a solo home run. Schimpf hit a two-run home run in the third inning and Christian Bethancourt hit a solo home run one out later.

Tonight’s second game has Jarred Cosart (0-1, 5.79) taking the mound against Jacob deGrom (7-5, 2.35). First pitch is at 4:10pm PDT.

The Starters

He stunk. He allowed a league-leading 33 home runs in pitcher-friendly Petco, and he posted a below average ERA once accounting for ballparks. He also pitched “just” 202 1/3 innings, his lowest total since his rookie campaign, while also notching a career-worst 3.6 walks per 9.

He was sneaky good. Shields’ 25.1 percent strikeout rate was the highest mark of his career, up nearly six percentage points from 2014—even though his velocity was down 1.5 miles per hour. His HR/FB was an unsustainably high 17.6 percent, and it’s bound to regress significantly going forward.

Huh, strange year. The glass half full outlook says Shields can keep his strikeout rate up while cutting down his walk rate and home run issues. That version of Shields would put him back on the fringes of the Cy Young race, but he’s 34 now—we won’t go quite that far.

Ross feels like the type of pitcher ready to breakout as a true staff ace at any moment, and he’s come tantalizingly close already. He has his warts—trouble holding runners, higher than desired walk rates, injury risk due to heavy slider usage—but he also excels at just about everything you want from a pitcher. His 25.8 strikeout rate in 2015 marked a new career high, and that figure has been on the rise every year for Ross. His groundball rate has trended in the same direction, and last year it also reached a new peak at 61.5 percent. With sustained health and improved control, there’s no reason why Ross can’t take another jump forward in 2016.